


Spanning Time

by SKSuncloud



Category: Naruto
Genre: AU, F/M, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-03
Updated: 2014-12-03
Packaged: 2018-02-28 00:03:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2711621
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SKSuncloud/pseuds/SKSuncloud
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shikamaru was going to propose to Temari, but he missed her train, so he just sits there at the station, but someone else ends up showing up. SasuNaru seen through Shikamaru's eyes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Spanning Time

**Author's Note:**

> I originally wrote this fanfic in 2007 while I was in high school and it has been posted on fanfiction.net since that time. It's the oneshot I wrote from that time that still gets really lovely reviews so I finally reread it and decided to post it here. This version has only extremely minor edits to make the reading smoother in some places because I wanted to maintain the original fic as much as I could and still include it on ao3 without feeling embarrassed by such old work. It includes an interesting perspective and I'm proud of myself for writing this fic at that time.  
> I may start going through more old fics and including them on ao3 in the same manner , but just this one for now.

  


“Damn.” I thought, sighing heavily and rocking back onto my heels before planting myself squarely back on the ground.

The platform was already completely abandoned and I could hear the whistle of the last train floating away into the evening as it quickly gained more and more distance from the town. The lights around the station were beginning to flicker on in groups of about five at a time. Inside the station I could hear the night janitor dragging his trash cart across the wooden floor.

Never in my life had I anticipated the train actually leaving on time. Even with as late as I was, I thought I might have at least a few seconds to wave her back… or… something. Still, I knew I should have been here sooner. I told Ino so when she’d been so insistent upon picking the “perfect” ring at the very last second. Any ring would have been fine, I’m sure. No one could expect much from a guy like me anyway. I know for a fact my taste in material things is skewed from any other person’s. But the fact that Ino used this as an excuse to try on _every_ ring in the shop before picking one was really troublesome. When she’d picked out one that she said would be “most appropriate” then she made me practice what I was going to say and had to coach me on how to behave. As if I’d listened. Is it supposed to be so much work to just ask a girl to marry you? By the time I could get away from her I was already going to be later than I’d expected. If there was ever a next time, I’d forget asking for Ino’s help, friend or not.

I guess it’s just lucky for me that I get over disappointment quickly. So her train left… oh well. Life’s not perfect. It was really too late anyway, that was my own fault for waiting for the very last day to make a decision. It isn’t as if she’d have stayed either way, and now there would be no telling when she’d be back. It wasn’t as if she’d wait for me to go there either. She’s more of a ‘now or never’ sort of girl. Too bad it would probably be never. Oh well. If this stupid ring turned out to be superfluous then I’d just give it to Ino as a birthday present or something. It isn’t like she’d ever get proposed to with how thin she insists she needs to be, and every girl needs at least one ring in their life.

I sighed again. Too bad. Back to work for me. She’d be working too. They’d all gone back to wherever they came from across the sea so that her little brother could step up and take back control of the city. She’d be busy. Now I could go back to learning how to run the family business.

I walked over and sat down on a wooden bench right between two lights where shadows fell. Sitting, I scratched my chin. Ino had made me shave this morning. She says that girls don’t like guys with “stubble” but I’m not totally sure, she’s got warped interests too.

I’d have time to get back to all the people asking me to take on governmental positions and stuff. Ever since I decided to actually take my final exam I’d been getting letters right and left asking me to join all sorts of junk. It all just seemed like too much work, but it would be good money, and it isn’t like I’d be busy with much else anyway. Not anymore.

With my right index finger I traced the letters of her name on the bench. T. E. M. A. R. I.

Falling in love really was just too much trouble. I should have stuck with not caring and not listened to my dad. Oh well. Too late now.

I started wondering how long I’d sit here moping, but decided that I didn’t care. Eventually I’d get bored and get up and go home. It was a warm night.

The sky was growing dark, but I could see a light approaching in the distance and heard a faint hooting like that of an old train whistle.

For a second I wondered if she’d beat the conductor into turning the train around so that she could at least say “goodbye,” but it was coming from the wrong direction , and they’d taken one of the new trains, not one with the tall chimney thing like this one had.

I remained seated as I watched the train approach the station. For some reason I’d thought that nothing ran at this time of night and the abandoned platform confirmed my thoughts, but maybe I was wrong. After all, the lights on the overhang were on, so someone had to be expecting something.

From the opposite direction of the one in which the train was coming, someone was running with heavy footfalls. The person leapt the railing that separated the platform from the grassy yard out front and ran to the center, just a few meters from where I sat quietly in the dark. The person was breathing hard as if they’d run very fast a long way, and they were trembling. He didn’t look in my direction, but I recognized him from his bright hair and stupid orange sports coat.

I wondered what he could be doing there. There was no way Naruto had missed saying goodbye to Temari or either of her brothers, and he couldn’t be trying to leave town. Rumors had been flying that he would be asking Hinata Hyuga to marry him within the week. They’d been apparently dating for a few months, and it was no secret that she’d liked him since about middle school. I decided to be a bit worried about what he could possibly be doing.

I moved as if I were going to get up to talk to him, but the train whistled again and I stopped. Something about him surprised me and made me curious. He watched the train inch along the track with longing clear on his face and his hands were clenched tight at his sides. He looked like he was about to collapse and seemed sadder and more hurt than I’d ever seen him before in my life. The kid was peppy as anything and more optimistic than anyone I’d ever met before, but he was clearly in some sort of melancholy desperation now.

A light flickered over his head just before the train pulled to a wheezing stop. He took a step forward, then rocked back to where he’d been standing before. Over the hiss of steam, I thought I heard him whisper, “Please.”

Curiosity had apparently killed some cat somewhere, but I was beginning to wonder if anyone had ever died of being lazy. There was no way I was going to get up for anything less than to stop the boy from jumping onto the track.

The train was black and short with only one passenger car. From that car, the only door was sliding open slowly. Due to shadows there was no way to see inside. It wasn’t until someone stepped down from the train, holding a dark duffle bag in one hand and carrying a guitar case on his back, that I stopped thinking that it was a ghost train.

Naruto took a deep breath and looked about to cry the way his shoulders shook, but he didn’t move, just dug his nails further into his palms. I leaned forward and squinted to try to better make out the shape of the only passenger who had emerged before the door slid closed. I was far enough away that my movements were unnoticeable above the sounds of the train and movement of the shadowy passenger.

The darkly clad person stepped fully onto the platform and immediately the train began to squeal to a start again and pull away from the station. It was then that Naruto moved. He dashed forward and flung his arms about the neck of the stranger.

The person seemed surprised and dropped the duffle bag onto the platform. Then his shoulders seemed to drop and he fell into the intimate embrace, wrapping his arms about Naruto.

Naruto had buried his face into the person’s shoulder and from how he shook I thought he might be crying. It seemed so out of character for him to act this way. The Naruto I knew had always liked to dominate any situation with a wacky grin on his face. Seeing him like this made me feel… empty… or something.

The darker person dug his nose into Naruto’s hair as if he were going to smell it. Light glinted off his silver studded wristband and it caught my eye. I wish I knew who it was. I was also beginning to wonder if I should worry about Hinata, or if I was jumping to conclusions.

“I missed you so much!” Naruto sobbed as the train left the station. His voice was loud, but muffled by the other’s shoulder. Too bad for me that I have really keen hearing and didn’t really have the option to not eavesdrop on their moment together.

“Dork,” was the shaky reply of the one he was holding. From the way he spoke and the way he clutched Naruto as if his life depended on holding him closely, I knew he really meant to say that he missed him too. The voice though… I was sure I’d heard it before, though even my mind could be playing tricks on me what with all the troublesome things that had happened that day.

“I almost gave up on you coming back.” Naruto admitted, turning his head to the side so his voice wasn’t muffled anymore.

“I could never have stayed away forever. Not from you.”

This time my ears almost twitched with recognition. I couldn’t believe it until he lifted his head from Naruto’s and looked down at him with those deep blue, almost black eyes.

His hair was longer, and he had five piercings in the cartilage of his left ear, and he was considerably taller and thinner than I remembered, but as he moved and I saw the symbol tattooed on his shoulder, there was just no mistaking it. Sasuke Uchiha? But what the hell was he doing here? And at this time of night…

Sasuke had been gone for three years chasing after his prodigy brother who had up and left after a mass murder in which the rest of their family had been killed. The whole thing had happened so long ago, but rumors had flown out that Itachi, Sasuke’s brother had joined the mafia in the city, so finally Sasuke had set out after him.

Personally, I’d never been able to stand the guy. He was a bit of a genius, and he was good looking, so all the girls loved him, but he was stuck up and angsty because he didn’t have any family left and was living by himself. I guess though, it was because of that that he and Naruto had grown so close. Naruto had no family either, an orphan for as long as anyone could remember. They’d been close friends and fierce rivals all through school. It was really Naruto who had been more upset than anyone when Sasuke left. It changed him drastically, matured him in an extreme way, and now…

I wanted to leap to my feet and demand to know what was going on. What gave him the right to just come back like this after all this time? But the way Naruto held him… the way they held each other, I had no will for it. I just sat there.

So Naruto had never given up on Sasuke. I guess you could call that romantic in a sense. Their friendship had spanned the years or something.

“I thought… you’d never…” Naruto was trembling hard again. He might have cried, but Sasuke stopped it with a quick movement. He placed one of his hands on Naruto’s cheek and brought their faces together.

I looked away. So that’s how it was, was it? I can’t say I was surprised. Hinata though… Well, it didn’t matter. I could hear the passion between them and I tried to tune it out. This really wasn’t my business.

The velvet box in my pocket weighed heavy against my side. Stealing a glance back at the kiss on the platform, I couldn’t help but smile. Maybe there was an understanding there or something. I felt like I could accept them like that. It didn’t matter where Sasuke had been or what made him come back. Love was love, right? It didn’t have to have a code or rules or anything. Actually, it was sweet altogether. Troublesome, but sweet.

I sat there for at least another five minutes while they stood and held each other and Sasuke apologized for being away so long and Naruto brought back his stupid optimistic smile. And then I sat longer, after they’d walked away, I watched the tracks in the direction Temari’s train had gone.

So maybe it wasn’t too late. I might as well just keep the ring around a few more years, just to see.

It was a really warm night. Warmer now, as a soft breeze had picked up to circulate the air. The overhead light flickered again. 

When finally I stood, I found myself smiling, hands in my pockets. When Temari came back, I’d have to remember to kiss her the way Sasuke had kissed Naruto. 

The sun would rise again soon, but it didn’t matter. Tomorrow would be a day to sleep through either way. Life was just so troublesome. I’d wait a day, then maybe I could get back to those people wanting me to join their companies and go into government. Or maybe I’d rent myself a black ghost train and go after her… maybe…


End file.
